The Pay Increases . . .

My little brother is finishing a job on our house after the roof was damaged by hail and wind.

As always, I help out and am mostly the gopher. I used to work with him in our younger days…20 years ago or so. I did drywall finishing (to an extent, ha …mudding seams and hole patching and sanding) painting, staining and sealing and whatever I was capable of helping with.

Today as I am helping, Wessie called and was discussing the pay. Wessie told my brother that his pay doubled if I had to help him. They both thought they were hysterically funny.

Throughout the day my brother would have me do stuff and say he wanted to make sure that the double pay would last throughout the job and laughed.

So… he had this ladder that was on a bit of uneven ground. He thought that I should stand on one of the pieces that resemble rungs on the other side. Ever obliging, I hopped right up there. He is working and I am happily standing there gabbing away. When he says it is okay for me to get down, I cannot move. My feet were shaped around those thin little “rungs” for such a while that it felt so painful to pull them up to step down. All I could do was stand there and laugh about not being able to move. He said take your time the pay is double!

We moved on to the gables. I think that I forgot to mention that he was putting up soffit. He would cut the pieces a few at at time (of course nothing on our house is even so the piece sizes varied) and we would carry them over. Once there, he would climb up and I would hand him pieces. He wanted the first piece and I handed it up to him. He handed it back down and asked for the first piece he had down there that was bent. I ever so proudly told him that I noticed it was all bent and I had straightened it out for him! His little head sort of sagged and he looked back up, actually he looked down but since he had his head hung he had to sort of look up. Haha. He smiled and said that he had bent it as it was the piece that went in the middle of peak and it had to be that way. I think that this time I was the one who said the pay increases!

Now we move on to the back of the house. I have two bird feeders that I hang under the soffit. This seems to be the magical place that the squirrels cannot figure out how to get to and drain the feeders! As my brother was closer to putting the soffit up I reminded him to mark where the holes were for the hooks for the feeders. I have no idea why that was a dumb reminder that I had for him but, but he seemed relieved that the pay would stay at the higher level. Wessie had come home from work at that time and they chuckled. For some reason I guess you do not put hooks back in the original spot, you just make new holes. My brother said he would just let Wessie hang them for me.

The job was finished and my brother left the ladder up so that the feeders could be hung.

Here is a side note. . .remember that I have had a few falls in the last few years with some resulting in broken bones.

I excitedly ran to get my feeders. Our deck has multiple levels with slight step downs. Running, on the way back to them with a feeder in each hand (you know what is coming here!) I run over a step down. Both legs twist and I make those groaning/screaming noises that I make when I hurt something and then I start laughing as usual.

Wessie stops what he is doing, points his finger at me and tells me angrily that if I broke my foot or ankle or anything I do not get to feed the birds any longer!

My brother turned and we looked at each other questionably and our uncontrollable laughter broke out. What sort of comment was that Wessie??!! Since I broke my foot before from coming off of a step down out of the bathroom at my niece’s wedding does that mean I do not get to go to any other weddings or do I not get to go the bathroom?